It has become well-known in recent years to use snowboards on ski slopes as another form of winter recreation similar to skiing- Snowboards are commercially available, for example, from Burton Snowboards of Manchester, Center, Vt.
A snowboard rider uses a boot designed especially to the requirements of snowboarding. As with skiing, it is required to secure the boot to the snowboard with a binding. However, snowboarding differs from skiing in that both user boots attach to a single snowboard, and the user does not employ poles. Also unlike skiing, the boot bindings are mounted to the snowboard with screws into a pattern of screw holes, possible threaded inserts in the snowboard. This pattern of screw holes or inserts typically allows adjustment in stance relative to the longitudinal center line of the snowboard and stance width. The stance angle is varied with user preference and the style of snowboarding intended. Stance width is selected by the user on the basis of personal comfort and leg length. Typically, changing the stance angle means releasing the boot from its binding and loosening the mounting screws so that the binding may be rotated, and then retightening the screws. Changing the stance width means removing the screws entirely and selecting another pattern of screw holes or inserts in the snowboard.
Before the present invention, it was not known in the art to have a readily available adjustment to the stance angle without removing the boot from the binding so that the user could change his orientation relative to the board.
When using commercial ski area chair lifts, a snowboard user is required to disengage at least one boot from a boot binding to maneuver onto the chair because he is generally immobile with both legs attached to a single board, no ski poles, and no downward sloping terrain in his intended direction of travel. With one leg disengaged, he pushes himself forward with his free leg. This maneuvering with one leg attached to the snowboard and the other free is referred to as "skate boarding."
Having mounted the chair with only one boot attached to the board, the user is again challenged to dismount from the chair in full motion with a single boot engaged, usually down a slight incline. A toughened surface is usually provided on the snowboard for temporary control during dismounting; the user places the unbound boot on the roughened surface which then allows limited control until he stops to rebind the boot to the boot binding. Thus, the snowboarder often finds himself stopped soon after dismounting from the ski lift chair to remount his free boot, often endangering himself and others, or he may have fallen for lack of adequate control.
Before this invention, a quick release of the boot binding from the snowboard from the user standing position was not known in the art, nor was it known to have a device on the bottom of the disengaged boot binding to improve traction. Generally, one boot had to be unstrapped from a board, an inconvenient and cumbersome task, as best. Then, with one boot disengaged, the user attempted to approach the ski chair lift. Although routine for traditional skiers, this normally simple task became a challenge without poles to assist, using only the disengaged boot pushing against the snow and ice with limited traction.
One solution to rebinding problem is to attempt to rebind the boot while sitting on the chair. This is usually very difficult and perhaps dangerous. Another solution is to have a couplng for one boot binding easily released upon maneuvering toward the ski lift chair that quickly rejoins the boot and boot binding to the board. Kincheloe, U. S. Pat. No. 5,035,443, describes a binding designed to disengage easily. Briefly, the coupling comprises a channelled groove into which a plate slides to a securing position. In practice, it is found that the coupling does not operate quickly enough to reengage upon dismount from the lift chair during the dismount action. It is also found that when ice gathers in the binding, the boot may not mount at all until ice is cleared. Thus, the problem remains to have a binding that is not only easily released but that reliably and quickly reengages the boot onto the board, even in the presence of ice and snow.